Pakistan need to overcome fear

Timidity will kill you on the cricket fields of Australia. Pakistan teams in recent years have not taken heed of this basic tenet when coming out to play against Australia, and the hammerings they've experienced have generally been preceded by submission to fear. If this side is going to learn the lesson, it has started off slowly.

It is easy to be meek tourists here. Stadiums, like the MCG, are not playing fields as much as they are vast, lonely chambers of interrogation. The sheer size can eat you up. The crowds are huge and loud and the more you let them get to you, the more they bring it to you.

There used to be days, of course, when the Australian side really brought it all to bear upon tourists like some brutal theatre; the noise, the crowd, the glares and chatter from players, forever pecking away at you like some wild-eyed malevolent woodpecker. Those days are gone but Pakistan have still been playing their ghosts in this Test; ghosts of men such as Matthew Hayden, Justin Langer, Shane Warne, Glenn McGrath and their intimidating ways. There are no demons in the pitch or in the bowling. Australia's batting is solid, but not murderous anymore. And yet Pakistan has played them like it was 1999, not 2009.

The initial selection told it. Abdur Rauf is a sum of many commendable things but he is not, as is Umar Gul, an attacking fast bowler. Gul may be in an uncertain patch in his career right now, but can anyone deny that he is, in essence, a wicket-taking bowler? They would've played with two spinners had Danish Kaneria not been injured, but a case could even be built for going in with five bowlers. It further weakens an already dodgy batting order but then Pakistan are not, and have never been, India. They win Tests with their bowling not their batting. Pakistan's was an honest effort with the ball, but when did honesty ever win anything?

They then began their innings in the afternoon so meekly it was difficult to know they were there. Solidity is often the order of the day as far as Pakistan's opening is concerned, but not sluggishness; surviving 13 overs of the new ball as an opening pair is an achievement for Pakistan, but going at two-an-over negates that, especially if wickets are never stable. So unwilling were Pakistan's top three to dictate terms that it took them 32 overs to find the first boundary, a passage of extraordinary conservatism in this day and age. Their coach Intikhab Alam didn't think it was, arguing that stability was needed, this being Test cricket. It is, but not from 1969.

It is precisely why Umar Akmal is so refreshing; he is not timid, in fact, he may be even a little too cocky, though time will better judge that. But he has intent and clarity and in these days when the meek no longer inherit the earth, that can take you places.

Australia have made a national habit out of it. India have been successful this decade because of it; they've had men like Virender Sehwag, Sourav Ganguly, Yuvraj Singh and Harbhajan Singh, men who do not take backward steps and who make themselves known by coming at you. The Pakistan sides that have been successful in Australia have had such men - Javed Miandad, Imran Khan, Sarfraz Nawaz, Mushtaq Mohammad and Wasim Akram.

There is natural aggression in this Pakistan side, but it stands strangely doused and latent. Young men like Mohammad Aamer and Akmal junior have it; even in Mohammad Asif's wily ways there is a streak. But there are too many who look restrained and submissive and that cannot be the successful way. Perhaps it is the natural calm of the leader and though that is sometimes necessary with Pakistan, it can also be lethargic and reactive. The aggression somehow needs to be harnessed and a snarl needs to come out soon, for otherwise the Test and series will be gone before they know it.

Already, the maximum they can hope for here is a draw. And that will be a kind of victory in itself, given they have lost nine on the trot against Australia. But that cannot be the extent of their ambition, not in this land. Somehow they have to open up, they have to chance it and really let themselves go.